Semester Takeaway

I feel like creativity has a lot to do with your state of mind.  depression, anger, and other emotions or states of being can really hinder any creative thoughts and processes. The thing to overcome these obstacles is to change your perspective. If you can harness your ability to change your perspective even just a little bit, your creativity will blossom.

Life is difficult and will get in your way many, many times but if you don't make time for yourself and your personal needs, you won't grow as a person.  Growing as a person is one way i feel creativity becomes natural and real. Your creativity grows with you, it doesn't stay the same. It's a dynamic concept.

Takeaway 16

Change is something I don't deal well with. It's scary and new and I hate scary and new. But sometimes change is a completely necessary aspect of life. There is no way of changing change. You can try, really try, to avoid it but change is going happen. Your best bet is to take that change and embrace every aspect of it.  Change can and most likely will broaden your horizons.  Change makes us better people, for the most part that is. Sometimes, you just gotta go with the flow and accept that some things are out of your control.

"Altared" Book of the Self

What is your opinion of combining technology and the human body as she did in the video?
I don't necessarily think there's anything wrong with her incorporating technology with the human body like she did, but I don't completely agree with it either.  Sure, cosmetic things are completely fine (like the perfume pill) but there comes a point where it's too far and we are messing with things that shouldn't be messed with.  I don't know where that boundary is yet because we haven't actually started messing around with this kind of experimentation on a larger scale, but there is a boundary.

What is your opinion of combining a media arts and science project with your own body?
I would not combine a media arts and science project with my own body.  That's something I would just not do.  I like my body just the way it is and I would not change it for a project in college.

How will you change this book?
I will change this book into something beautiful by folding some of the pages into paper cranes.

How will this book change you?
I think it's opened my eyes up to new possibilities.  There are beautiful things to be found in ugly and boring situations.  It all just matters in how you look at it and what perspective you hold.  That's what I've learned from this horrible, ugly, boring book.

__________________________________

So my book is The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck.  I absolutely hate this book.  It's ugly, horribly written, and just plain boring.

I then opened the book to a random page and ripped some of the pages out.

And the cut those pages down to somewhat really uneven squares. Them not being even is what really made the swans look stupid.

Swan number 1. Not too shabby if i do say so myself. It's not the prettiest swan, but it will serve it's purpose well.

Here are 4 total swans.  I was going to make 10 of them, but a) it's a lot harder than I had thought, b) I'm extremely lazy, and c) i feel like I have proven my point that I made John Steinbeck's ugly book somewhat beautiful and for that I am really happy.

Takeaway 14

Because of this class, I have changed my major.  Again.

I'm going back to Neuroscience.  I've realized it is definitely in my best interests to pursue this major because I am completely and utterly enthralled by the human brain's composition, the human psyche, and the function our nervous system performs.

It really is my passion.  Hasn't the whole theme of this class been to find what you are passionate about and incorporate it into your everyday life so you can continue to be creative?  If not, well then I completely missed the entire point of this class.  But you know what?  I don't think I really care.  I've found what makes me happy and feel complete. And that's all that matters today.

Fear

The fear I have identified is more of an anxiety than anything.  I notice it in a lot of ways in my life such as: not wanting to go to places I'm unfamiliar with, not wanting to meet new people, and not wanting to speak out in any social situation where it isn't required (example: my job).  This fear has me not experiencing life.  I have so many aspirations and dreams and goals but I just can't actually go out and get them done.

I have no use of fear in my life.  I really don't.  But yet there it is, lurking beneath the surface whenever I have the random urge to do something outside of my "norm".  This really effects my life in a pretty negative way.  I don't go out and do new or exciting things or go meet new people or travel unless someone literally forces me to do it.  If I had a choice I would have nothing to do with anything of the sort.

This also does nothing positive for my creativity.  I feel like to have creativity one needs to embrace change and new experiences to grow as a person.  If you can grow as a person, I feel your creativity grows with you.  It all depends on your perceptions and experiences.

My fear takes the form of feeling like I'm not adequate for anything or anyone.  But by creating this (not very good) painting of my fear, it kind of takes it outside of me so that I don't have to focus on it anymore.  It's almost like it isn't my problem anymore because it has materialized outside of my body.

Bliss

For the bliss assignment I honestly did a whole lot of nothing.  It was very relaxing to get in touch with my inner self and see what all I have been neglecting to take care of in the chaos that is life right now.  The outcome of this was pretty surprising though as I now have a pretty good grasp on why I do the things I do.

So here are my 3 "What if's..." for the Bliss assignment:

1. What if I stopped caring so much what other people thought of me?
2. What if I found a way to meditate so that I could be in my creative zone more?
3. What if I focused on me more and less on everything that is going on around me?

Takeaway 12

I find the universe interesting.  Like mind-blowingly interesting.  Just think, we are tiny, minuscule ants compared to the vast size that is the universe.  The massive rock we live in that is floating through space around a giant ball of molten stuff is just a grain of sand in the grand scheme of things.  There is no way that we are the only living things in our universe; but we aren't advanced (or ever will be) enough to be able to conduct deep space exploration.  Other life forms could be out there, doing their alien things, and we would never know unless they wanted to make contact with us first.  And to be honest, I don't think they would want to ever make contact with us.  If they have the technology and knowledge to discover us from millions of lightyears away, they would be too advanced.  To them, we would be a very primitive species.  It's crazy to try and wrap my head around just how massive our universe is; but it's impossible to do that.  There's no way our human mind could ever comprehend how large the universe is.  There's just no way.

Some astrophysicists even believe that there is a multiverse.  That there are more universes out there outside of ours.  We will never know in the near or distant future unless we develop a technology to see past the edge of our universe.  It's just not possible with what we have right now.

I don't know what's out there.  It's trippy to think about all of this, really, but I just find it so damn interesting to think about.

Takeaway 11

Talking about fear has really gotten me thinking today after class.  Fear can be a crippling experience; but it can also be a great tool for success if you can harness it to use it positively.  Basically, fear can be used to do things someone wouldn't normally do.  For example, if you embrace your fears, you could create some awesome work that you would never do if you couldn't get past your fear of failing miserably.  I would consider that a great outcome of fear.  The problem lies in actually being able to gain control of your fear.  That's is the greatest obstacle.

Takeaway 9

Something that stuck with me in class was, "Why go left when you could go right?"  I really thought about it today and I think what it means is: why stick with what you know if you can do something new? New generally means change and generally change is terrifying.  Humans are creatures of habit. We like solid, predictable patterns and minimal change; but what if every once in a while we did something that wasn't the borm?  It could lead to new and exciting experiences that could change your entire life.  I feel sometimes its better to go against what you are used to doing and try something new.  I feel it makes us all better people.

The flavor of ___ sounds like...

So I ate a habanero pepper for this project.  Just so you know, that shit's extremely hot and uncomfortable if you aren't accustomed to such flavorful heat.  Now to create something form the sensations I got from how the habanero tasted was pretty difficult.  I tried to convey an image from a haiku that would show how hot this damn pepper is.

Searing, blistering

Pain is creeping from the sides
Crunching through the heat

Takeaway 8

You know, sometimes you think you know people and you really don't.  It's a fucked up world out there and we take solace in knowing that somethings are concrete and okay and never going to change much.  But we are all in for a surprise. People all have their dirty little secrets.  Everyone has that one side of them that they never show to anyone; not a single soul will ever see that one facet of their personality.  But, sometimes that horrible thing that is inside everyone comes out to say hello and all it leaves in it's wake is devastation and sadness because it's just so fucked up.

Just know that you may think you know someone who you have grown up with, spent your entire high school years with, and spent time with outside of graduating high school is hiding something.

You've Got This Covered!

So I don't have anything done to bring to class but I do have ideas.

Here they are:

1. Do absolutely nothing to the cover.  

Seeing as this is supposed to go loosely with the previous project of where we defined who we were and why were here on our blind contour drawings and I did nothing to mine, I thought maybe it would work for the book cover as well.

2. Cover the cover in blank, white or off-white paper.

I don't really know how I came up with this but I really like the idea.  I like how it would make the book undefined and with the beauty of the cranes it kind of seems like it's saying beauty is undefined.

Takeaway 7

I'd have to say this is the first class I have ever enjoyed so thoroughly that isn't a web design related class.  It's absolutely crazy.  I've been going through some pretty stupid shit in my life recently and I think this class came to me at the perfect time in my life to have the greatest impact on my future.

Now on to the takeaway from class.

This class session would have to be the most inspiring thus far.  Passion is something that should have a place in everyone's lives.  It's such an integral component to one's happiness it's ridiculous.  When you have passion for something, it absolutely shows in the end product.  It's obvious to look at a piece of work and see the difference between the result of someone with a passion for the project and the result of someone who is doing it just to do it.

When you have a passion it's like you have fulfillment in yourself and your life.  When you participate in your passion it's complete bliss.  Frustrations can, and definitely do, come with one's passion but the fulfillment and happiness vastly outweigh the frustrations.  It's awesome knowing that there is one or two different activities that make a person something bigger, something better.  I don't really know how to explain it, but I know it's there and I love it.

Who am I? What am I doing here?

I wasn't in class to do the whole activity or whatever that went down to get the blind contour drawing, so I was told to do a blind contour drawing of myself.  Here it is in all of it's awesome glory.  It totally looks like a real human being is you squint a lot and tilt your head a solid ninety degrees.

Ha.

Anyways.  I decided to do nothing with this drawing because I couldn't come up with anything.  I feel like that really represents me and what I'm doing here. I have no idea who I am or what I'm doing at any given moment, really.  

Right now I'm still building whatever you build to become someone.  This is a long process.  I've always lived with someone telling me what to do, where to go, what to eat, and what to dress with little to no freedom.  Now I have the opportunity to do all of those things with complete freedom.  So I would argue that I am now starting my journey to figure out who I am.

To answer "What am I doing here?" I would have to say I'm here get help and gain an insight as to where to get help with my journey to being someone.  There is nothing more to that statement and nothing less.  Pretty straight forward, really.

Takeaway 6

Procrastination sucks.  Like really, really, really, really sucks.  Procrastination drags down my motivation and destroys any and all productivity I could achieve because I get stressed out I've procrastinated so much I have mounds of things to get done with not enough time.  This takeaway is a whopping week and some odd days late for submission.  Yay.

Yay for procrastination.

"Bible" Dipping

Reused is the word we were assigned to create around in class. What the hell do I do with something reused?  First off here is the definition of reuse according to Google:

re·use

verb

rēˈyo͞oz/

1. 1.

   use again or more than once.

   "the tape could be magnetically erased and reused"

noun

rēˈyo͞os/

1. 1.

   the action of using something again.

   "the ballast was cleaned and ready for reuse"

The first thing that comes to mind when I think of reused is trash and recycling.  I mean generally we reuse things that we would normally throw away, don't we?  So, yeah, trash.  But I got to thinking early this morning.  Air is something we reuse everyday.  We reuse blood cells until they die after about seven to eight days.  I'm going to do a rough sketch of of the pulmonary system (that's the heart and lungs kids). So the picture above is the larynx, trachea, lungs, and heart.  

It looked too boring and it still kind of does now, but I wanted it to be a little different.  I saw an ashtray that belongs to my roommate and it was full of ashes and cigarette butts.  I dug out all of the butts and dumped the ash into a bowl and added water to make a really watery paint.  I took that watery nastiness and painted in the lungs, larynx, trachea, and heart. 

So yeah, I made a point that we reuse all the air around us AND I actually reused something.  Go me.

Takeaway 5

The drawing activity we did at the beginning of the class was interesting.  While most people that spoke up agreed that the activity was stressful, I found that the activity was pretty relaxing.  Don't get me wrong, it was full of uncertainty and it was slightly uncomfortable, but ultimately I found it to be relaxing.

Which is weird if I really think about it because all this time I've felt solace in controlling everything I do.  Normally being in control is comforting, but this activity where I didn't have any control kind of opened my eyes to a whole new side of things that I can explore.

Control doesn't have to be everything.  We were talking today in class about how some of the best work people have created was when they had let go of everything and just let it be what it was meant to be.  I think there is a lot of truth in that thinking.  For me, having control is something I enjoy, but at the same time a massive amount of stress normally comes with it.  But on the other side of the coin, not having control was uplifting and really enjoyable actually.  I feel like I need to relinquish control of things more often and let things be and if it turns out in my favor then great, I'll keep it; if it doesn't turn out in my favor, I'll go back and retry it with minimal control added and see if I can receive a different outcome.

Breaking the Rules

Normally I don't break any rules except for when I'm driving, but for this assignment I am required to break the rules of something.  So I have decided to break the unspoken rules of designing professional looking websites.  You know what I'm talking about.  Professional websites don't have those garish, clashing colors and mismatching content sections, or break the flow of information presented in a sensible fashion.  Having no other ideas, I went with it.

Here's a screen shot of it in all it's ugly glory:

Takeaway 4

Something that really stuck with me during class was when we were talking about how we (Americas) are pretty sheltered from the outside world.  We really are.  And I would wager most of us don't even know it.  None of our news stations that talk about anything of importance concerning our own country, let alone foreign affairs, are extremely biased.  Nothing is unbiased, true news anymore.  To get any real information about what's going on in the world you need to tune in to a foreign news station.  I think it's ridiculous.

I feel like being a sheltered nation is hurting us.  All we know about the world is what our news channels tell us.  Most of us are too lazy to go ahead and look up this information from a reputable news source so we take everything at face value and don't question it, and I find this is extremely frustrating to me.  With better informed citizens I feel like we could become even a greater nation and be able to make better decisions as a whole, but until then I don't believe we will stay on top for much longer.

50 "What ifs..." with the Grapes of Wrath

After much thought and deliberation I have finally come up with a book that I hate enough to do this project with.  At first I couldn't think of anything.  I'm not much of a book hater. In fact, I love books, all kinds of books, even course textbooks to some extent.  Books are an invaluable resource.  If there were to be some horrible disaster where we were reduced to caveman times and no technology worked, we would be left with non-technological things to figure out how we as a society could get back to where we were and that's where books come in. Ha ha.

But anyways, back to the topic at hand.  The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck.  God, what a boring book.  I understand it has importance in regards to a look into an ordinary family during the Great Depression, but it is so ungodly boring it doesn't make sense.

The 50 "What if..." questions:

1. What if it wasn't so boring?
2. What if the reason I hate the book so much is because I can't relate to it?
3. What if I could relate to the content and the story?
4. What if I can't relate to it is because I have an irrational fear of living in poverty?
5. What if I have an irrational fear of living in poverty because society puts such a large emphasis on monetary value?
6. What if I can't find anything to do with this for the final project?
7. What if I worry too much about everything and life?
8. What if I can relate to this ungodly boring book on a subconscious level?
9. What if I will never know?
10. What if this not knowing will drive me crazy?
11. What if I go to an insane asylum because of some weird psychological problem caused by some sort of cognitive dissonance because of this stupid book?
12. What if I'm already crazy?
13. What if this is all stupid and I'm making a big deal about irrational thoughts?
14. What if the reason I feel so uncreative is because I don't embrace the irrational tendencies of my personality because irrationalism is frowned upon by today's society?
15. What if I'm so caught up with being a product of today's society that it's driving me crazy?
16. What if this is all just stupid and I should stop worrying?
17. What if I can never stop worrying about all of this?
18. What if I can take all of this worry about being driven crazy and turn it into something positive?
19. What if I just had an epiphany about the final project for class?
20. What if I could finally figure my life out because of this book I hate so much?
21. What if this stupid book changes my life?
22. What if my life changes for the worse because of this book?
23. What if it changes for the better?
24. What if I will never know?
25. What if what drives me as a person is knowing things?
26. What if I'm just making shit up by now?
27. What if the key to life is being an awesome bullshitter?
28. What if that question above is just horse shit and it will never lead to anything?
29. What if I could understand this all in a different context?
30. What if I'm making a big deal out of nothing?
31. What if the key to creativity is making a big deal out of nothing?
32. What if I'm doing this assignment completely wrong?
33. What if the point of this assignment is to get yourself into a state of mind for personal reflection; to understand yourself better?
34. What if I'm completely wrong in my assumptions?
35. What if I fail this assignment?
36. What if I stop caring?
37. What if the reason I put so much importance on everything I do because I care too much about everything?
38. What if this doesn't mean anything?
39. What if nothing means anything?
40. What if things not meaning anything ruins my outlook on life?
41. What if this whole ruining my outlook on life situation actually doesn't ruin my outlook on life but improves it?
42. What if I can't incorporate these thoughts into my Altered Book?
43. What if I accidentally destroy my outlook on life?
44. What if this destroys me as a person?
45. What if I can't rebuild myself as a person if I somehow destroy it unintentionally and I'm left as a shell?
46. What if I have to live my life as a shell of my former self?
47. What if all of my fears stem from question number 46?
48. What if life is pointless?
49. What if life really is pointless and I will never know?
50. What if I can use all of these 'what if's' to make myself a better person for myself because questioning this book has given me a higher understanding, all because I hated a book?

Now I just want to take a moment and figure out how the heck all of that happened and where it came from.  This has taken an interesting turn and I feel like it really needs to be investigated and understood.  Maybe this whole exercise is supposed to be a learning experience about yourself. Or maybe I completely did things wrong and screwed up the whole assignment.  But, you know what?  Who really cares?  This is a very different class and is meant to turn your current perspective and flip it around so you can see the world in a new light. So maybe this is exactly what I was supposed to do.  Maybe I'll find out sometime soon what all of this means.

Takeaway 3

Unfortunately I couldn't make it to class today because of car troubles, but I had an interesting conversation with a friend about balance.

I believe we need balance in our everyday lives.  Without it we, or at least I, get either extremely stressed out with my responsibilities or get depressed because I put too much focus on a few things and completely disregard others (homework is a great example here).  Balance, or lack thereof, can create some pretty awesome things like art, a great project at work, or a happy social life; but the beauty of life stands in the balance of yourself, your social life, and your professional life.

The thing is, how do we figure out this beautiful balance?  If we tip the scales more towards ourselves we can find out what really makes us tick but we will lack in social and professional areas.  The same goes for focusing more on social and professional areas that we will lack in the other two areas respectively.  But, there also lies beauty in the unbalanced life.  These unbalances can lead to growth which will lead to an eventual, better balance if one can keep moving forward.  Say you focus on yourself more than the other areas.  Once you have reached a pinnacle of acceptance for yourself it will improve both your social life and your professional life and I believe this is still true if you focus on being social and excelling in your professional life.

Polly Wolly doodle all day?

To be honest I didn't even think about the four s's while I was doodling.  All I did was choose an easy listening Pandora station, plug in my headphones, and start doodling.  Not a whole lot of thought went into anything, really.  While I wasn't contemplating the four s's while I was drawing I could interpret their meaning from the doodle right now.

Of course there could have been things going on in my subconscious, but I'm not entirely sure.  I guess I did surrender to the music and just focused on that while I let myself draw whatever came to mind which did have some lovely and some not so lovely results.  I've never been much of a doodler but it did kind of help that I was in the zone to do some doodles.

Takeaway 2

I think it has something to do with connecting with our inner child.  When we were little we were full of different ideas and aspirations and we didn't have limitations to our imagination.  For me, as I grew up I was told that some of the things I wanted to do weren't practical or I didn't have any support for the ventures I wanted to pursue.  So I dropped them and went after the path my parents wanted me to go.  I’m not saying I don’t appreciate what all they have done for me, but I feel that a lot of their actions have dampened my curiosity and imagination.  In my mind imagination has a lot to do with creativity.  In your imagination anything is possible and ideas can pretty much flow like water.  When someone is trying to think creatively I feel like having a solid connection to your uninhibited imagination is key.

So having our required textbook as a coloring book, something I’m sure a large portion of us had access to when we were young, is a way for us to connect to our inner child.  In a way it’s a connection to our younger, wild imagination because it’s possible that we have just learned to ignore our imagination to succeed the way the world wants us to succeed now a day’s as a cog in the corporate machine.

Color Your World

I colored my page in black and white.  Black in white is easy to understand and interact with.  Everything is clear cut and incredibly easy to understand because there is no room for questioning or error.  You do it this way or this consequence is going to happen.  In a black and white world there would be much less confusion or error.  There would be no gray areas to murk up the understanding of the world and how things are to be.  

The Egg and the Eye

var sum = 0;

for (var i = 0; i < numberSet.length; i++) {

    console.log(numberSet[i]);

    sum = sum + numberSet[i];

}

var average = sum / numberSet.length;

The Javascript code above is the basic idea behind finding an average of a set of numbers and can be found on my egg for the Egg and the Eye experiment.  I was  stumped for coming up with an idea for this project for quite a while and I had inspiration at the weirdest of times.  I was doing some reading for a computer science class about algorithms and the different types and their respective uses and it just kind of hit me.  I was going to take a snippet of code I had learned in a programming class about averages and write it on my egg.

We are all average to an extent.  Our looks are average, we act pretty average, our ideas are mostly average, this egg is average.  Nothing about us or anyone else is inherently special about you or me or this egg or anyone else.  Sure everyone has the right and the ability to think they are some special and unique little butterfly, fluttering about life in an extraordinary way; but in reality they are just as average as everyone else in this world.

Don’t get me wrong we all have the potential for greatness, but if every individual doesn’t have access to the tools and knowledge to make them great then what are they left with?  Being average is what they are left with.

Takeaway 1

What really resonated with me yesterday in class was the photo that is posted on the class homepage. 

“Can you remember who you were before the world told you who you should be?”

Well, can you?  I’m not so sure I can remember anymore.  For as long as I remember I was always told there was only one way to my future and that was it.  No other options.  Absolutely nothing.  This future contained: high school graduation, attendance of a four year university, graduation of said four year university, and employment at some firm with a nine to five desk job earning a six figure salary.  I can remember talking about the plans I had for my life and being shot down when the occupation weren't up to my mother’s standards concerning monetary value.  Hey guys, guess what?  I don’t care what my future salary is going to be.  The one concern I have that has any pertinence to my future is my happiness.  As long as I’m happy I don’t care if I’m the poorest person out there or the richest person out there.  Money doesn't have anything to do with one’s happiness.

Sadly this is not the mindset of today and it probably has quite a bit to do with why I can’t remember who I wanted to be or my dreams and ambitions before my future had any real importance.  I’m sure that I’m not the only one out there that feels this way.  How much of an impact money has on people and they don’t even know it?  What would our world be like if there were more people out there living new and different lifestyles?  Lifestyles that would be preposterous in today’s society?  It would be interesting to see a world like that; to live in a world where you are completely and utterly free to make your own choices and follow your dreams without any pressure to fit today’s “norm”.